Confronting campus anti-Israel activism

More than 500 people packed Boca Raton Synagogue on April 23 to hear Jewish community leaders, elected officials and students confront campus anti-Israel activism, after an earlier contentious incident at Florida Atlantic University sparked a firestorm.

The controversy was set off by fliers posted on dormitory doors by the campus group Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), notifying the residents of a mock "eviction," and which contained the stamp of FAU's housing authority and Palm Beach County. And although FAU issued a statement condemning the event as an isolated incident, Jewish leaders are calling for further investigation to determine if the incident exposes a broader base of campus anti-Semitism.

Featured speakers included U.S. Rep. Ted Deutch, D-Boca Raton; Joseph Sabag, Florida region Zionist Organization of America; Matt Weisbaum, managing director of StepUpforIsrael and JerusalemOnlineU.com; Scott Brockman; director of Hillel of Broward and Palm Beach County; Brooke Weinbaum, FAU student leader, and Rabbi Efrem Goldberg. The event closed with a screening of "Crossing the Line: The Intifada comes to campus," which explores anti-Israel and anti-Semitic activity taking place on campuses around the country.

"When I heard about the mock evictions, I was shocked that this type of propaganda was able to get to students' personal spaces," Weinbaum said. "SJP thought it was a 'creative' way to get their word out, but I have never thought of 'hate' and 'lies' as creative. It is unfortunate that this happened, but it was certainly a wake-up call for all students, administration, and of course the community."

Weisbaum believes the incident at FAU reflects "a much larger campaign" to delegitimize and demonize Israel. "College campuses are a flash point in this effort, as these hate groups target well intended young people who more often than not are ignorant of the facts and are susceptible to the misinformation being spread about the only real democracy in the Middle East," he noted.

"The danger of this campaign is the long-term effect of these lies on the future leadership of America, potentially misleading them into positions that are detrimental to the cause of freedom everywhere," he said. "The painful irony is that were these self-professed human rights advocates in the Middle East, the only country they'd be allowed and protected in spouting their hatred would be in Israel — not in Syria, Egypt or the Palestinian Authority, all of which silence, intimidate and oppress dissent through the most despicable means imaginable."

Deutch said the synagogue event drew attention to an issue that has "struck at the core of our community and so many like ours" throughout the country and around the world.

"SJP's use of intimidation and scare tactics against their fellow students under the guise of free speech is dangerous and utterly unacceptable," he said, and praised event speakers for "showing the way our community can come together to support each other and our students — calling out SJP's vitriolic lies and standing together to fight any group that tries to delegitimize Israel."

Deutch and other speakers took issue with FAU's handling of the situation. "Because these eviction notices were sanctioned by the University, the students and others who learned of this action on campus deserve to know what action was taken in response, and to be assured that this kind of atrocious behavior will not be repeated," Deutch said.

Sabag concurred. "The FAU administration had known for months that its SJP chapter was engaging in hate speech and had organized public rallies calling for violence against Israel. Rather than scrutinize SJP, the university instead recklessly approved the eviction notice and had one of its employees accompany SJP as they posted it on over 200 on-campus residences.

"Afterward, the administration invited SJP to continue its anti-Semitic messages by concluding that it had 'found no evidence that the postings were intended to target or intimidate individuals of any particular religion, national origin, or faith,'" he said. "We won't let this issue continue to be avoided or ignored by the University's administration."

Former Florida House Majority Speaker Adam Hasner, who is currently running for Congress, echoed those sentiments.

"No one is objecting to the free speech rights of the group that put up the mock eviction notices," he noted. "The concern is that FAU has failed to live up to its responsibility and exercise the moral clarity to call this message what it was — anti-Semitism."